@DetroitDan Russia is a sovereign state only to its borders.

To extend the analogy, it may well be unwise of someone to stroll along “my sidewalk”. Maybe I’m pretty strong, and have the capacity to beat the crap out of interlopers, even kill them. Maybe I’m so strong they can’t arrest me. Maybe it’d be better for all concerned if everyone just pretended the public sidewalk was mine. 1/

@DetroitDan That’s a judgment call! After all, the sidewalk is, in an ethical sense, not mine. I have no right to it. But maybe actually enforcing others’ rights would be costly to all concerned, and many people agree it would be sound judgment to leave well enough alone. 2/

@DetroitDan Nevertheless, if some motherfucker disagrees and strolls along the side walk, we might regret it ever happened, but we still have to bear the high cost of trying to arrest and lock you up. Because fundamentally that motherfucker had a right to do what he did, even if it was poor judgment on his part, and I had no right to beat and kill him, and tolerating extralegal beatings and killings is something we collectively wish not to do. Even if, hypocrites we are, other times we have./fin